Doc's Talk: Debbie Wasserman Schultz: Constitutionally Ignorant and Politically Tone-Deaf

Monday, June 04, 2012

Debbie Wasserman Schultz: Constitutionally Ignorant and Politically Tone-Deaf

A Miami synagogue recently canceled DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz's planned speech about "Maintaining a Strong U.S.-Israel Relationship" at a Friday night religious service after an influential Republican member of the congregation, Stanley Tate, resigned.

The Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel published an editorial shortly after the incident decrying the temple's "stifling" of Wasserman Schultz's speech and criticizing the synagogue for "advanc[ing] the voices of intolerance." What the editorial board of the Sun-Sentinel failed to tell its readers was that Mr. Tate had not wanted Schultz's speech muffled, but had merely asked for equal time for rebuttal and to have the entire discussion moved to a venue other than in the sanctuary during a religious service. It was a plea to his congregation of 70 years (whose Joni & Stanley Tate Early Childhood Center bears his family's name) not to endorse or give even an appearance of religious endorsement of Wasserman Schultz's political speech, and by extension a religious endorsement of President Obama and the Democratic Party's 2012 election campaign message.

There is an irony in this church-state "speech stifling or speech endorsement" incident, because Debbie Wasserman Schultz was involved in another "church-state" "speech stifling or speech endorsement" issue in Florida almost ten years earlier -- an incident which the Sun-Sentinel characterized as a "nationwide controversy" but which received only eleven lines in the local section of the paper, buried within minutiae about local school board officials and a local judge's political ad.

In the summer of 2004 -- the same summer that Floridians were experiencing the devastating effects of Hurricanes Charley, Frances, and Jeanne, then Florida Democratic State Senator Wasserman Schultz had picked a fight with Governor Jeb Bush over the First Amendment, "separation of church and state," and what Wasserman Schultz complained was a "hurtful and offensive" display of a religious symbol inside the governor's office in Tallahassee that should "not [have been] imposed on the public" because it conveyed the wrong "message."

It wasn't a Nativity scene in the Florida capitol's entranceway during the Christmas holiday season or a sculpture of Moses receiving the Ten Commandments. Nor was it a loan to the Republican governor of Titian's Pieta from the Gallerie dell'Accademia of Venice. Wasserman Schultz complained about the display of a greeting card on the bulletin board hung above the Republican Governor's General Counsel's receptionist's desk along with several personal family photos belonging to the receptionist. The greeting card featured a picture of the American flag with a white cross superimposed amongst the white stars on the flag's blue field background. According to the Palm Beach Post's report about Wasserman Schultz's complaint, the artwork on the greeting card was designed by a Tallahassee photographer to commemorate the victims of 9-11, but Wasserman Schultz objected to its display because it sent a hurtful and offensive message that the country was a "Christian nation." The Palm Beach Post article reported that Governor Bush's general counsel's response for its request for comment was that "it warrants no response."

Although almost no one in South Florida ever knew about the "nationwide controversy," the pre-Facebook and pre-Twitter internet lit up in angry response. Among the more benign comments was a post by "Colorado Doug," who wrote, "Suppose a muslim employee had a greeting card with a crescent moon displayed, would Wasserman Schultz or anyone else be offended? I think the answer would be no." "ZULU" commented, "If Ms. Wasserman ever took the time to visit Normandy, she would see a sight which, no doubt would horrify her -- rows and rows of crosses and stars of David." Someone named "Anonymous" wrote: "To me, your face is offensive and hurtful, but my solution is to avoid looking at it." Most of the comments were so vile and anti-Semitic that neither the Palm Beach Post nor the Sun-Sentinel would reprint them.

I wrote to the Sun-Sentinel about the "nationwide controversy," and although almost every letter I have ever submitted to the paper has been published, this one wasn't. My letter contained a message that the Sun-Sentinel didn't want its readers to hear, although I did get a personal note from the reporter who had written the eleven lines thanking me for "sharing" my thoughts with him.
In my letter to the paper, I explained that 20 years earlier, in the mid-'80s, I had represented seven churches in Scarsdale, New York that had sued the Village of Scarsdale when their jointly and privately owned Nativity scene was no longer allowed to be displayed for two weeks in a public park in the center of town, where it had been displayed amongst other Christmas decorations for over a quarter of a century. The case was so controversial that the large New York City law firm where I was a junior associate didn't put its name on the briefs -- just mine and the senior partner's. We argued that the temporary display of a crèche in a public park during Christmas was constitutionally protected symbolic speech and that the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment -- often colloquially referred to as the "separation of church and state" portion of the First Amendment -- didn't permit Scarsdale to suppress our clients' speech in the absence of any reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions governing the use of Scarsdale's parks. We never expected the case to end up in the United States Supreme Court, but it did, and we won by a 4-4 split vote affirming our victory below in the Second Circuit Federal Court of Appeals. I told the Sun-Sentinel in my letter that not only was Wasserman Schultz wrong on the law -- there was no governmental endorsement of religion by a secretary's display of a cross on a greeting card in her own personal workspace, no matter how visible the location was to the general public -- but the state senator was also wrong on the facts. My experience in the Scarsdale crèche case had taught me that constitutionally ignorant and tone-deaf politicians like Wasserman Schultz engender more anti-Semitism when they use "offense" and the "First Amendment" to attack their political opponents. The reaction to the Anti-Defamation League's Amicus Curiae brief against our church-clients' nativity scene was a perfect example of this regrettable phenomenon.

Wasserman Schultz currently faces a Republican opponent in the upcoming 20^th Congressional District -- Karen Harrington -- who has already received the endorsement of prominent Jews in Florida (including Stanley Tate) as well as many national and state representatives. Harrington is a small business owner who has run a family restaurant with her sister for thirty years. Now that South Florida synagogues will likely turn off the speech spigot for Wasserman Schultz and other Obama surrogates, the DNC chair will no doubt turn to making more rounds on the Florida condominium circuit praising President Obama and the Democratic Party. But she has a tough sell: Florida's seniors as well as the state's general electorate are ravaged by Florida's real estate crises and unemployment figures. And Florida's seniors, who are deeply worried about funding ObamaCare, recognize that there are wiser and more surgically precise approaches to Medicare and Medicaid reform.

After the Temple Israel debacle in Miami, the Obama Team and the DNC have figured out that that the choice of Wasserman Schultz was a perverse choice for "Jewish outreach" in Florida. Many of Wasserman Schultz's Jewish constituents don't care deeply about Israel. (Those who do would have voted for Romney anyway.) The others are more like Wasserman Schultz herself on the subject: agnostic, uninformed about Middle East history, and uninformed about Obama's "Love Me I'm Not George Bush" Middle East foreign policy. The Wall Street Journal published an eye-opening piece about the Florida congresswoman back in February this year, which did a light air kiss on Wasserman Schultz's polarizing comments about the Republicans' "Jim Crow" laws and the Tea Party's blame for the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. The Journal piece mentioned Wasserman Schultz being asked by President Obama's advisers to meet with "two seasoned Democratic female pros, Anita Dunn and Hilary Rosen." Hilary Rosen, of course, was the "seasoned" expert who decided that attacking breast cancer and MS survivor Ann Romney for "never working a day in her life" was a brilliant way to frame the Republican "War on Women."

Meanwhile, South Floridians expecting any balanced editorializing on the subject of Debbie Wasserman Schultz will have a tough time finding it at the Sun-Sentinel. This is, after all, the same newspaper whose local editorial columnist, Stephen L. Goldstein, thinks nothing of exhorting readers to perform a "Mitzvah" by voting Democratic, not Republican ("Democratic Punch": Sun-Sentinel January 31, 2010).
Sara Goodman is an attorney practicing in the areas of intellectual property law and commercial contracts. She may be emailed at lawofficeofsaragoodman@gmail.com.

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The IDF’s Minorities in Numbers and Pictures

In honor of IDF Diversity Week, we present diversity through numbers and pictures. Each year, more and more Muslims, Christians, Druze, Bedouin and immigrants from around the world take on the responsibility of defending Israel.

MUSLIMS:

Muslim Arab Israelis are not required to draft in the IDF, but there are many who volunteer. In 2013, there were over 200 Muslims serving in the IDF and over 300 in the reserves.

Bedouins:

Bedouins are nomadic Muslims who were in Israel when modern borders were set in place and are now considered Israeli citizens. They are not required to draft but a growing number choose to enlist. In 2012, there were over 1,400 Bedouin Muslim soldiers doing regular IDF service and almost 1,500 in the reserves.

Read more:http://www.idfblog.com/2014/02/27/truth-idf-numbers-pictures/#more-34027

Are you aware that in 2013, Middle class taxes go up-significantly?

In January of next year, the federal income tax rate for middle-class taxpayers is scheduled to rise from 25 percent to 28 percent, and the payroll tax is scheduled to rise from 13.3 percent to 15.3 percent… This drives the marginal tax rate based on the aforementioned three taxes to 48.12 percent. Add in state and local property, corporate, excise, and other state and local taxes, and the percentage of each additional dollar that is taxed hovers around 50 percent… When half of each additional dollar earned is taxed away, taxpayers experience a disincentive to start businesses or expand existing ones. This leads to fewer jobs being created.

Why is HAMAS Inside Tampa Schools?

Clare Lopez

Kelly Miliziano, who teaches history classes at Steinbrenner High School in the Tampa, Florida area apparently thinks it’s perfectly OK to invite a senior official of a HAMAS-affiliated organization into her classroom to discuss Islam with her students. According to local media reports, not only has this been going on for years, but in spite of the civil and criminal proceedings that could result from such reckless negligence, the Hillsborough County school superintendent, Mary Ellen Elia, and the chairman of the school board, Candy Olson, also expressed approval for students under their responsibility to be exposed repeatedly to guest speaker, Hassan Shibly, who is the Executive Director for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in the Tampa area.
More...

Did You Know... Ignoring the Call to Islam will Bring Jihad

‘Conquest through Da’wa [proselytizing] that is what we hope for. We will conquer Europe, we will conquer America! Not through sword but through Da’wa.’
-- Yousef al-Qaradawi , Muslim Brotherhood spiritual leader The Arabic word ‘Da’wa’ means the “call to Islam.” But do not think that Da’wa is the same thing as an invitation to an optional holiday event. The classical Islamic doctrine of jihad mandates that enemies must be given the opportunity to convert to Islam or pay the jizya tax before it is permissible to attack them.
Clare M. Lopez

Who is being discriminated-facts tell the truth

Religious bias

Hate crimes motivated by religious bias accounted for 1,409 offenses reported by law enforcement. A breakdown of the bias motivation of religious-bias offenses showed:

65.4 percent were anti-Jewish.
13.2 percent were anti-Islamic.
9.5 percent were anti-other religion, i.e., those not specified.
4.3 percent were anti-Catholic.
3.8 percent were anti-multiple religions, group.
3.3 percent were anti-Protestant.
0.5 percent were anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc.

http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/hate-crime/2010/narratives/hate-crime-2010-incidents-and-offenses.

On March 31, 1977, the Dutch newspaper Trouw published an interview

with PLO executive committee member Zahir Muhsein. Here's what he said:

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct "Palestinian people" to oppose Zionism.

For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."

In March 1977, Zahir Muhsein, a PLO executive, said:

"The Palestinian people does not exist. The creation of a Palestinian state is only a means for continuing our struggle against the state of Israel for our Arab unity. In reality today there is no difference between Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese. Only for political and tactical reasons do we speak today about the existence of a Palestinian people, since Arab national interests demand that we posit the existence of a distinct Palestinian people to oppose Zionism."

"For tactical reasons, Jordan, which is a sovereign state with defined borders, cannot raise claims to Haifa and Jaffa, while as a Palestinian, I can undoubtedly demand Haifa, Jaffa, Beer-Sheva and Jerusalem. However, the moment we reclaim our right to all of Palestine, we will not wait even a minute to unite Palestine and Jordan."

The Arab Apartheid

Ben-Dror Yemini
In 1948, the Arab countries refused to accept the UN partition proposal and they launched a war of annihilation against the State of Israel which had barely been established. All precedents in this matter showed that the party that starts the war - and with a declaration of annihilation, yet - pays a price for it. Between 550,000 and 710,000 Arabs fled because of the war and a larger number of 850,000 Jews were expelled or fled from Arab countries (the "Jewish nakba").
Population exchanges and expulsions were the norm at that time, occurring in dozens of other conflict points and affecting about 52 million people. In all the population exchange precedents that occurred during or at the end of an armed conflict, there was no return of refugees to the previous region, which had turned into a new national state.
Only the Arab states acted completely differently from the rest of the world. Instead of assimilating the refugees, they crushed them despite the fact that they were their coreligionists and members of the Arab nation - instituting a regime of apartheid. So the "nakba" was not caused by the actual dispossession, which had also been experienced by tens of millions of others. The "nakba" is the story of the apartheid, oppression, abuse and denial of rights suffered by the Arab refugees at the hands of the Arab countries. (Maariv)

International Law and Military Operations in Practice - Col. Richard Kemp

"Islamist fighting groups study the international laws of armed conflict carefully and they understand it well. They know that a British or Israeli commander and his men are bound by international law and the rules of engagement that flow from it. They then do their utmost to exploit what they view as one of their enemy's main weaknesses. Their very modus operandi is built on the correct assumption that Western armies will normally abide by the rules, while these insurgents employ a deliberate policy of operating consistently outside international law. "

Lost Historical Moments

What Rabin’s last Knesset speech really said:repudiation of a Palestinian state

Rabin ruled out a fully sovereign Palestinian state :

“We view the permanent solution in the framework of State of Israel which will include most of the area of the Land of Israel as it was under the rule of the British Mandate, and alongside it a Palestinian entity which will be a home to most of the Palestinian residents living in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. We would like this to be an entity which is less than a state, and which will independently run the lives of the Palestinians under its authority.”

Rabin ruled out a total withdrawal from Judea and Samaria and thus a return to the pre-June 1967 borders :

“The borders of the State of Israel, during the permanent solution, will be beyond the lines which existed before the Six Day War. We will not return to the 4 June 1967 lines.”

Rabin ruled out withdrawing form the Jordan Valley:

“The security border of the State of Israel will be located in the Jordan Valley, in the broadest meaning of that term.”

Rabin ruled out uprooting settlement blocs, like the Gush Katif bloc in Gaza (which was subsequently uprooted by former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon):

“The establishment of blocs of settlements in Judea and Samaria, like the one in Gush Katif.

AND

Rabin ruled out removing any settlement before coming to a full peace agreement with the Palestinians:

“I want to remind you: we committed ourselves, that is, we came to an agreement, and committed ourselves before the Knesset, not to uproot a single settlement in the framework of the interim agreement, and not to hinder building for natural growth.”

Rabin insisted on Israel retaining full security control of the borders with Egypt and Jordan, contrary to Israel’s relinquishment of the Philadelphia Corridor on the border with Egypt:

“The responsibility for external security along the borders with Egypt and Jordan, as well as control over the airspace above all of the territories and Gaza Strip maritime zone, remains in our hands.”

Correcting Oslo Myths-Part 2

3) Kuttab laments that the post-1993 Oslo process resulted in a Palestinian Authority "whose ministers and legislators are not guaranteed passage between Gaza and the West Bank ...."

Before free passage or other perquisites, PA leaders were obligated, among other things, to eliminate the terrorist infrastructure in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, end anti-Israeli, antisemitic incitement in schools, mosques, and communications media, and resolve all outstanding issues through peaceful negotiations. They met none of these commitments, sometimes bolstering terrorism and greatly increasing incitement.

4) Kuttab complains that under Oslo the PA got "lightly armed police ---- but no real sovereignty over the land or contiguity between our communities in Gaza and the West Bank."

Oslo agreements repeatedly were revised, regardless of Palestinian non-compliance, until the authorized number of police grew from 8,000 to 40,000. Though they were to be the only armed forces in the territories, Israeli estimates early in the second intifada put the number of gunmen - police, "security services," terrorists, and armed gangs - at 85,000. Their armament reportedly included not only heavy machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, but also anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles.

Sovereignty was to be negotiated in the envisioned 1998 "final status" talks - after a five-year period of confidence-building. Palestinian leadership chronically undermined the process. Palestinian terrorism made the 1993 - 1998 Oslo period more deadly for Israelis than the 15 years preceding it.

The United States doesn't have contiguity between the lower 48 states and Alaska and Hawaii; territorial contiguity between the West Bank and Gaza Strip - that is, through the 20 miles of Israeli territory between them - was never promised and would destroy Israeli contiguity.

5) "Palestinians have been made to endure hundreds of checkpoints in the West Bank, an eight-foot wall deep in our territories, and tight Israeli control over borders."

The security barrier is not "deep in Palestinian territories," but rather encompasses less than 8 percent of Judea and Samaria, and is mostly a fence, rarely a wall; the land in question is not "our [Palestinian] territories" but disputed territory to which, according to the authors of U.N. Security Council Resolution 242, Jews as well as Arabs have claims; and there are no international borders, only the 1949 armistice lines with Jordan. Under 242, borders remain to be negotiated. As for checkpoints - like the security barrier and "tight Israeli control" - Palestinian Arabs precipitated these measures themselves. No terrorism and there would be no fence or tight Israeli control and few checkpoints - like before the first intifada.

Correcting Some Oslo Myths

1) In Oslo "Israeli, Palestinian and other world leaders promised that ... Palestinian sovereignty would be solidified."

No, they didn't. The 1993 Declaration of Principles and subsequent Oslo agreements outlined a process by which final status negotiations about the West Bank and Gaza Strip would be reached. The process required an end to anti-Israel terrorism and incitement and a commitment to peaceful negotiations. The PA, Fatah, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and other terrorist groups, sabotaged the process from the start.

2) "The reality is that, in defiance of U.N. Security Council Resolution 242, which states that it is inadmissible to occupy land by force, Palestinian territories are still under foreign military occupation."
Wrong again. Resolution 242 (1967) does note "the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war." It also affirms the right of every state in the area "to live in peace with secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force." There were no "Palestinian territories." Jordan occupied the West Bank, Egypt controlled Gaza. Israel did not have "secure and recognized boundaries," so retention of some of those territories was possible under 242. Israel is not a "foreign" military occupier in the West Bank but, pending final negotiations, the lawful military administrator as a result of a successful war of self-defense.

Doc's Talk